The annual Senegalese ‘King of the Arenas’ (Senegalese wrestling), held on Sunday, April 22, was a contest between Balla Gaye 2 (yes, the same one that beat Tyson in my other post about Senegalese wrestling) and Yekini (yes, he named himself after the popular Nigerian football player of the 90s). Yekini, being the reigning King of the Arena, and having won for the past fifteen years (or so I heard) was heavily favoured. Unfortunately, we can’t always win and Balla Gaye 2 emerged the winner to the dismay of all Yekini’s supporters. It was also rumoured that he would be retiring after this match – he was, after all, 35, a dinosaur as far as Senegalese wrestling was concerned. Interestingly, these wrestling matches are really only about bragging rights and popularity and BOTH wrestlers still get paid – the same amount! So while Yekini may have lost his bragging rights, he still won a whopping 100 million FCFA, a little under 200 thousand dollars.

At least he gets to retire well. But perhaps not so much. By the time he finishes paying off all his supporters and marabouts, trainers, family members, etc, it’ll be a wonder if he has anything left.

In other news, the French presidential elections held on April 22nd saw the two favorites (Sarkozy and Hollande) remaining as such as they would both go against each other on May 6th, the day of the run off. However, the biggest news was the ascent into third place of the extreme right party, headed by Marie Le Pen. Well then.